How To Insulate Yourself Against Shocks
by Vaysh11
Summary: Draco hates winter. First the never-ending cold, turning his nose an unattractive red, and then the ever-startling shocks. Also, Harry Potter seems to pop up at the most unexpected places.


**How to Insulate Yourself Against Shocks**

_for Enchanted Jae_

o0o

'Merlin!'

It was bloody unbelievable. This had been the third electric shock since Draco'd gone outside, and it was only December. The air was crisp and dry, the view over the mountains seemed to stretch on forever. Draco had had a lovely walk around the frozen lake, with its abundance of dark green firs and the blessed absence of Gryffindor red. He'd (almost) calmed down after the _incident_ with Granger. How was he to know that the leather-bound volume of the Letters of Benjamin Franklin was hers, and not property of the Hogwarts library? Which apparently did not even own a volume of Franklin's letters, seeing as Benjamin Franklin was not only American but Muggle as well. Damn...

All that silly talk about Muggles 'inventing' electricity was grating on Draco's nerves. Here he was, out in the snow, and a tree branch – of a common Scots Pine, so heavily covered with snow that it hung low into the path – had zapped him. Draco hated winter, hated it! First the never-ending cold, turning his nose an unattractive red, and then the ever-startling shocks. During the cold days Draco's body was crackling with static electricity. He got shocks off of everything, not just of door knobs or pewter cauldrons. No, Draco only needed to touch his cloak, or turn a page, or even just lean upon the wooden frame of his four-poster bed, and a sharp shock of sizzling energy would shoot up his arm.

And now, after a long walk outside, a bloody tree – a plant, for Merlin's sake – had given him a shock. He might as well cast _Reducto_ on the thick ice on the lake and see if the water underneath would zap him, too. Nobody had ever invented electricity. Electricity – more commonly referred to as lightning, St. Elmo's Fire, amber magic or mineral magnetism in the wizarding world – was a thing to be harnessed or shielded against. It was _there_, a force of nature, and nothing anybody could invent. If anyone, then _wizards_ had invented the Leyden jar, seeing as the Universiteit Leiden had been the most advanced wizarding university around the time of the Statute of Secrecy. Honestly, Muggles didn't know half of it, and there Granger claimed they'd come up with a device that clearly had been invented by a genius of a potions master.

Draco hesitantly reached for the offending branch, to bat it out of his way so he could tromp up the path back to the castle. Touching it with his gloved hand, he held his breath. Being shocked by an electric discharge was bad enough, but _waiting_ for it to happen was so much worse. But only powdery whiffs of snow showered on Draco from above. The branch was safe. Apparently the crackling electricity – between him and a bloody Scots Pine – had evaporated during their first contact. Draco breathed out a sigh of relief. And froze mid-motion.

Potter stood before him, perhaps five yards away. Strands of black hair had escaped his red wool cap, and he had his school robes closed haphazardly over Muggle clothes. The winter sun reflected on his glasses and made his eyes glitter. Draco had never seen eyes that bright and green. And Potter was staring right at him.

'What?' Draco barked.

Two quick steps brought him to Potter's side but just when he wanted to rush past, Potter moved – a quick turn towards Draco. Draco's shoulder brushed Potter's chest, his hand involuntarily set on Potter's hip, bony and sharp beneath the robes. Draco could feel Potter's intake of breath at his right ear. He quickly pulled his hand away.

'Salazar! Do you have to bump into everything and everybody? Get out of my way!'

Potter opened his mouth, no doubt to shoot back some pathetic attempt at insulting Draco. But he seemed to think better of it. His lips closed to a thin line. Boots crunching loudly in the snow, he stepped back and made a silly bow as if to say, _All clear, Your Lordship._

Idiot.

o0o

It was the second Yule Draco Malfoy spent at Hogwarts. The lake was frozen, and the dungeons had icicles growing from the ceilings in the hallways. The only warm place in the castle was the library. Any kind of fire and flame was strictly forbidden, of course, but Madam Pince had ordered the house-elves to keep the rooms at a cosy temperature with their special brand of warming charms.

Of course, certain tables were still warmer than others. There was a faint draught where Draco was sitting, only perceptible if you sat and read for longer than just a few minutes. He would have chosen a table closer to the Restricted Section, which was known for having just the perfect temperature all year around, but of course Granger and Potter were hogging the tables there.

When Draco had entered the library after breakfast, Granger had already been there, nose in not one, but three heavy tomes simultaneously. Potter had arrived shortly afterwards to slump onto a chair and stare off into space. From an infallible source Draco knew that the Weasel was spending Yule at his hovel of a home. Said infallible source was moaning day and night about the fact that the Weasel's brat sister was spending the holidays at home, too. Honestly, Blaise should get a grip on himself. After all, he had got the girl he'd been lusting after for years, whereas Potter looked miserable whenever he crossed Draco's path. Which seemed to happen a lot lately – the path-crossing. Wherever Draco went these days, Potter seemed to pop up out of nowhere.

Through the shelves Draco could see Potter gnawing at the end of his quill. His eyes had the typically glazed-over look of the terminally bored. Draco had no idea why Potter and Granger were even taking Muggle Studies. He, of course, was forced to sit through the class; being pureblood and sporting a faded Dark Mark on his arm meant Muggle Studies were a required class for him. And yes, it had been fun (sort of) to hear about all the roundabout ways Muggles went about everything from flying to sending owls, but this whole holiday project on electricity was just ridiculous.

With an angry shrug, Draco wrapped his wool cloak tighter around himself and – damn! Another shock zapped up his fingers into his arm. Draco dropped _Predicting the Unpredictable: Insulate Yourself Against Shocks_ with a hiss. Merlin, maybe electricity _was_ an animate force, like the ancient Egyptians claimed, for the static charge on him clearly had just read his mind.

His must have been louder than he'd thought, for Potter was looking right at him from the other side of the shelves. Their eyes met. Potter must have been watching him, too. Listening, at least, for sounds coming from Draco's table behind the Invisibility Section. Draco glared at him and looked away, out through the window where the morning light glistened on the frozen lake.

He had touched Potter yesterday. Draco clearly remembered the warmth of Potter's body, and how solid his hip had felt underneath his touch. It had been a bright, cold day without a trace of dampness in the air. There should have been sparks flying between them, the way Draco had crackled with static. He'd got a shock off of a pine branch, for Merlin's sake. But not from Potter. Which was... rather odd, come to think of it. Only this morning Draco'd hexed a second-year for brushing against him and making him jump with the electric charge. Everybody was giving Draco shocks in this kind of weather.

But not Potter.

Feeling slowly returned to Draco's hand and he experimentally touched the cloak again. It felt warm and soft, all static gone. Draco looked back through the shelves. But there was only Granger, surrounded by her books.

o0o

Hot chocolate – the afternoon called for hot chocolate. Granger still presided over the library, and back in the Slytherin common room, Blaise drafted owls to his beloved, covered with – as much as Draco could see – little green hearts. Pathetic. Draco needed to get out of there. The dormitory with its frost-covered windows was out of the question. He'd freeze his arse off if he did anything there that didn't include snuggling into the warmth of his bed. So hot chocolate it was.

The house-elves offered to prepare it for him but they never got it right, not like the elves at home. Too much cocoa, not enough sugar, too much nutmeg, not enough cinnamon and missing a rich dollop of whipped cream altogether. Draco waved them away and tried to Accio the cocoa powder. There was a low rumble from the storage shelves but nothing came flying into Draco's outstretched hand. Elf magic, no doubt, prevented any wizard and witch from simply gathering whatever food they wished for. House-elves were odd like this.

Draco walked towards the shelf where he'd heard the cocoa powder move. There it was, big round boxes of it, _White Chocolate_ and _Mocha Flavoured Chocolate_ and what not, all imported from Italy. He reached up to take the _Sweet Ground Chocolate_ kind when he got a viscous shock. It zapped all through him, making him swear and jump and flail simultaneously, knocking down the White Chocolate box in the process. In the split second that it teetered on the edge of the shelf, Draco tried to get his reflexes to work but couldn't. All he managed was to screw up his eyes in expectation of a 12 pound box of cocoa powder smashing his nose.

The box never fell. The sharp, aristocratic bridge of his nose remained intact. There was only a whoosh of movement and the sudden warmth of a body behind him.

'Careful there, Malfoy,' Potter whispered in his ear, and Draco almost jumped again.

He opened his eyes. The box of cocoa was in front of his face, held in Potter's hand. Potter's other hand was wrapped around Draco's middle, presumably to move him out of the box's way, had Potter not managed to grab it in time. Draco couldn't help the thought, unbidden as it came, of what a Seeker Potter would make if he ever decided to go professional. Potter was warm, and soft and hard at all the right places. It had to be the electric shock from the cocoa box that made Draco lean back against him.

'You wanted this one?' Potter asked.

'N-no. I, er ...' Merlin, and now he was stuttering. It was the shock, most definitely. Draco pulled himself together but couldn't bring himself to move away from Potter. 'I'd like to have the sweet kind. The box to the right.'

With a quick stretch, Potter reached up to the shelf, placed the _White Chocolate_ powder back where it belonged and grabbed the _Sweet Ground Chocolate_ box.

'This one?'

Potter's voice at Draco's ear was light and smooth and – almost – sultry, nothing like Draco had ever heard him talk to anybody. And Draco could be mistaken (but he didn't think so) about the hard bulge he'd felt against his arse when Potter had stretched to reach for the cocoa.

'Yes,' he said, leaning back even further. Potter didn't budge. His erection was pressing into the folds of Draco's robes. Things fell into place – Potter's break-up with the Weaselette, his sudden appearances around Draco, the bloody green _staring_ all the time.

Draco felt himself get dizzy. He turned his head towards Potter who at same time turned his head towards Draco. There should have been a shock, an electric discharge of some kind – what with them standing on the cold kitchen floor, and metal pans and pots everywhere.

But only soft sparks tingled on Draco's mouth. When Potter pressed closer, warmth spread all the way to Draco's stomach. And when he in turn moved his tongue over Potter's bottom lip, a hard and certain need filled his cock. Apparently, the way to insulate against shock was snogging Harry Potter.

'Would you,' Draco asked around their touching of lips and tongues, for they weren't kissing, not yet, 'care for a cup of hot chocolate?'

Potter pulled him closer with one arm and answered with a fumbling, wet, an entirely irresistible kiss.

o0o

Really, the Slytherin dormitories in winter weren't all that bad, Draco thought. Their high windows were covered with fern-like patterns of frost. During the day, the ice crystals made the outside world shimmer blue and white. At night they glistened like bands of silvery nettles. It was a beautiful sight when one was lying in bed with a naked Potter, two cups of hot chocolate steaming on the night stand.

He would have to call the insufferable git _Harry_ soon, what with the stuff they had been up to those last days (and nights). Blaise had stared at them for a long, hard moment that first afternoon, packed his trunk without a word and moved into the deserted sixth-years' dormitory. Rumour in the dungeons had it that his room was littered with scrolls and scrolls of sappy poetry for the Weaselette.

Potter (_Harry_) was snoring gently. Draco got hard just from listening to the sound. He leaned over to ruffle Potter's wayward mop, but was abruptly held back by body memory alone, expecting a shock. He took a deep breath, sucking in the smell of cinnamon and sex and the faint whiff of brooms' wax that was in the air since Potter had crawled into his bed. Then Draco slid his fingers into the soft strands of Harry's hair.

_fin_


End file.
